2932/Uh-Oh, Darkseid-i-ohs

Uh-Oh, Darkseid-i-ohs
Date of Scene:	23 October 2017
Location:	Space: Sol System
Synopsis:	Quill starts out with Spaghetti-Os, detours around Darkseid, and ends up with a Kinect
Cast of Characters:	Star-Lord, Gamora, StarDrake, Groot

---

Star-Lord has posed:
     Having spent the last hour on the long-range comms Peter slides down the ladder from the cockpit, and hits the ship comms. "Hey, Gamora? You around?" he asks. "If you are, come up to the common room, dinner's on me," he says before he lets go of the intercom button and makes his way over to the kitchen and gets working on dinner. Which looks like it's going to be a couple of cans of Spaghetti-O's.

Gamora has posed:
5r    "Very well." The comment comes almost immediately after Peter's request, and, after a few minutes Gamora emerges out of her room, closing the door - and locking it - behind herself, before she trundles to the common room for food. 'Dinner's on Me' usually means Peter's wanting to make her try some crazy earth food, or he's conned someone else into fixing it. Still, Gamora can't complain too much. It's not like she's a much better chef, herself.
    She sniffs a few times, shakes her head and then sits down. "Where are the others?"

Star-Lord has posed:
Peter grins back over his shoulder and smiles. "Tonight, it's the culinary masterpiece that is Spaghetti-O's," he explains nodding to the pot he dumped two cans of the stuff into. He looks back and gives it a stir. "I mean it's not as fancy as the stuff Indigo does, but I used to eat these all the time after school," he says. Yep, another night of sharing food that Peter remembers being awesome.

     "Dunno, hopefully on Earth having fun," he gives it a thought. "In Rocket's case, I hope not too much fun. How about you? Get any time planetside? If you need a tour guide, I know just the guy for the job." He looks back at her and smiles.

Gamora has posed:
    Gamora sighs, "So you are going to eat it all befor we even leave?" she looks incredulously at Peter, then nods some. She shrugs, "Very well. Let us try your favorite meal from Earth." She sniffs again, her lips twisting, but not unpleasantly. "So this is the best culinary dish on Earth? And it comes in a can?"

Star-Lord has posed:
     "Well maybe not the best, but it's up there," Peter assures her as the pot begins to smoke. That means it's done right? He takes it off the burner and fans it with a lid. "And as for running, out, we can always buy more before we go. A lot more, actually," he says as he turns from the pot letting it cool to something less than lava like. "I think I found a way to collect at least some of that 70 million," he says.

Gamora has posed:
    Gamora frowns, but, she's listening. She Looks At Peter, and then, because either she knows he expects her to, or possibly because she simply can't help herself, she inquires then, "And how is that to be done, Peter?"

Star-Lord has posed:
     "Well, I met someone who was there when Darkseid was taken down and she," it's always a she with him isn't it? "Has the portal box thing, they used to send him off into space. She didn't show me the coordinates but with the box we could jump to where he's at and still bring back the body." He holds up a hand anticipating her argument. "I know the bounty said captured on Earth, that's why we'll reach out to the guys who set the bounty first and re-negotiate. And even if they don't go for it, I just got off with the Nova Corps, they'll pay a million just for proof the guy is dead." He turns back to the stove and starts dishing out Spaghetti-O's into bowls. He glances back again, his expression somewhat serious. "So, what do you think? Really."

Gamora has posed:
    "I think we should leave well enough alone. If it was - that easy - to capture him in the first place, someone else already would have provided the proof to Nova Coprs," she says, reasonably. "The -only- reason I even -entertained- the notion of trying was bcause it was Earth he was attacking," she says, gravely. Then, Gamora shakes her head, "If you take us, I will go. But, I will say it's a fool's errand, Peter." And that's not something Gamora says a whole lot.

Star-Lord has posed:
     Peter grabs a couple of spoons and along with the bowls brings them over to the table setting them down and shaking out a hand that's a little burnt. "Watch out," he says. "It's hot." he says putting a spoon in each bowl and sitting down. Seated he slides a bowl over to him and stirs it around thinking over Gamora's words. He pauses a moment then looks up. "Wait you only agreed because he was attacking Earth?" he asks, looking over at her, a surprised expression on his face.

    He goes back to his food, "Anyhow, I hear what you're saying, this guy is bad news, I saw video of the take down, but the thing is he's dead, and just a handful of people know where to find his body. It seems like a fool's errand not to walk away from that since we've got the chance."

Gamora has posed:
    "Very well, Peter." Gamora shakes her head, still believing that going after Darkseid, in this state, is as bad as, or worse, than going after Thanos. But it's clear that Quill has his mind set. She asks instead, eyeing the bowl of Sphagetti O's suspiciously, "When do we leave?" She pokes at it. "Why are there little yellow circles in the red goop?"

StarDrake has posed:
Spy on the Milano? What? Surely no robotic organism would leave an action-figure sized copy of their casual chassis stashed in Peter Quill's ship to SPY on anybody. No, of course not. It's here because Mikh sometimes likes to just drop in and it's easier to move his ghost to the local chassis than to travel. Besides which, he's been moving the somewhat repaired Star*Drake across the galaxy. That still takes time. And moving without a chassis isn't really ... good ... for Mikhail Drakos.

But the Star*Drake has arrived and been parked in Jupiter orbit and Mikh has flown over to where the Legion Cruiser is located, in what looks suspiciously like a life-pod, and has landed it next to the Milano. The ship allows him to come onboard with minimal wheedling (thanks for changing the key again, Rocket) and he walks into the common area. He's human-size, and looks mostly human except for the metal skin. Not gold this time, because that gave Peter flashbacks before. And if it's not immediately obvious that the usual highly armored death-bot is Mikh, well, there's the voice and the fact that he has the same ship logo on his shoulder patch area.

"Oh-oh, Spaghetti-Ohs," Mikh says. A moment passes as he reads the recent memory of his "action figure" drone. "Quill? You want to try to capture DARKSEID? You know that he and Thanos have the same hair stylist for a reason right?"

Star-Lord has posed:
     Despite the heavy being discussed, Peter smiles and says, "The yellow circles are the O's. It's an Earth letter. The goop is spaghetti sauce. It's good trust me," he says.

    When Mikh enters, and spouts the old jingle, Peter points to him. "See, Mikh's heard of them. Tell Gamora they're good. And there's some in the pot if you want some. If you eat I mean." He was never exactly clear on that.

     When things circle back to Darkseid, Peter sighs, "Everyone's a critic. He's dead, so we're not going after the guy so much as his corpse. A corpse can't hurt us, no matter how powerful the dude was when he was alive. So all we need to do is jump through a portal, get the body and bring it back, and if we can't for some reason, we just need some good pictures to give the Nova Corps and prove he's dead and we'll get a million unit payday. Hmm, I wonder if I could make the same deal with the Lanterns too..." he muses idly.

Groot has posed:
No longer the small sapling he was when they landed on earth, Groot creaks and moves slower now that he is full grown again. The big tree enters in and looks about, yawning a little. "I am Groot." He offers everyone, waving gently.

Gamora has posed:
    "And how many times have people thought I was dead?" Gamora asks, before eventually giving in to try these 'Spaghetti O's'. Her features twist some, and then she shrugs, and spoonfulls another bite. "Passable," she agrees to Peter, vaugely. "Hey, Groot. Peter wants to go find Darkseid's Corpse. Supposedly we will still get a million credits from Nova Corps for it. if we find it." She sounds doubtful. "Our Captain has not yet told us when we'll be leaving, however."

StarDrake has posed:
"They said Sherlock Holmes was dead too, and you know how that worked out," Mikh adds, hoping that Quill does in fact remember that. Because it was a while ago. And it ... hmm. Now have to run comparative literature scan of Gutenberg Project if it exists in this universe. What if Holmes never died? How would it start the literary trope if it never happened? What if all Mikh's clever cultural references are actually wrong in this universe. Intolerable!

"Hey, Groot. I'm still Mikh. Different chassis, on vacation."

Seriously, this is such a bizarre situation. OK, time to throw logic at it.
    (1) if Darkseid is in fact dead, proof would be worth it to Nova Corps, and Quill has negotiated that info. Also to their competitors the Lantern Corps. Probably also to a number of other worlds.
    (2) If he isn't dead, the information would still be highly valuable to the Nova Corps, and Quill needs to renegotiate that. It's hardly the Guardians' fault if he isn't dead after all.
    (3) There may be risk involved in showing up and collecting him if he isn't dead. It might also be needful to keep him dead if he IS dead. Both of these things may require access to FourthWorld tech.

"Peter. Renegotiate. We'll find out whether he is or is not dead. Try to keep it a million minimum. This is risky. If he isn't dead ... at one time he had the power to erase people from timelines."

Star-Lord has posed:
     Peter waves up to Groot. "Hey, good to have you back big guy. Spaghetti-0's in the pot on the stove if you want 'em."

     Peter sighs when people keep poking holes in his perfectly good 'he's dead' argument. "Yes, but Sherlock Homes is a book, and Gamora, you're the baddest assassin in the Galaxy. Also, I saw footage of him being taken out. There were a couple of Kryptonians I think, and a Asgardian and a bunch of other guys too, I don't think even you've fought that many guys all at once. I mean, guys that strong," he says pointing with his spoon to Gamora.

     Peter nods to Mikh. "See, Mikh knows what's up. Wait, what was that about timelines?" Peter asks, blinking. "Anyhow, I got to do some negotiating and then talk to the girl who has his portal box, and then we're set, I'm thinking a week?" he offers for the timing of their little suicide trip.

Groot has posed:
     Groot offers a high five to Mikh, looking to the group. "I am Groot." Not really knowing enough about Darkseid, but a million credits is a million credits. "I am Groot?" He asks, looking around for something to eat.

  Groot takes a spoon to the pot and tries some... "I...am Groot?"

Gamora has posed:
    "Very well." Gamora says, agreeably with Groot, "I know. But, Peter thinks it's really good. It must have something to do with the Earth pallette. I don't know." She rises, though, having finished her bowl, and Gamora offers, "I will go find Rocket, and let him know. Perhaps that will be enough to distract him until we leave."

StarDrake has posed:
"Yeah, wheat starch tubules in a sauce made from relatively non-sugary berries of an unusually non-poisonous varietal of nightshade plant," Mikh says, "With small amounts of animal protein possibly included. There are other ingredients. So many other ingredients. But to the human palate, especially the human child palate, it's delicious," Mikh says, smiling. (Look, he can smile in this chassis and everything.)

He sets a second consciousness stream to calculating the damage that could be done if he let Peter know that he's from a completely different universe. NNNnnnmaybe not. All this while he returns the high-five, because multi-tasking is good, even humans do it sometimes, right?

"Researched the guy ... after I heard he had hit Earth."

Star-Lord has posed:
     Peter looks at Mikh. "What he said. Actually, I have no idea what he said, but the point is they're good," Peter explains to Groot before looking to Gamora. "Good idea, tell him to come find me, I think I have something that might help us at least distract this Darkseid guy, if he turns out not to be dead." Hopefully long enough to get the heck out of there. "And, we should totally go to Earth sometime before we go, I can show you around," he adds to Gamora before she's gone.

     He turns back to Mikh. "So this one smiles huh?" he asks about his new ride. "And really, just wipes people out of timelines. We've got anything to counter that?" he asks.

Groot has posed:
     Groot keeps eating at the spaghettios, not knowing why he likes them, but seemingly liking it. "I am Groot!" After a moment, the big tree can't help but wonder about his friend Rocket. "I am Groot?" Not having heard from him since they started towards Earth.

StarDrake has posed:
"This one's close to the original, but not based on a chevy pickup, so it's far better," Mikh says. "Seriously, yeah, the Omega Effect. I've heard rumors. If it can't just disintegrate you by making your parents sterile or something, it ends up shooting you off in time. Can tell which one it did by checking the particle counts. And the stories said he had to work up to it, though. Like Voldemort doing Avada Kedavra. If you know who that is. I'm still not sure what year you were taken off-planet."

"Dunno, Groot, I just got here myself. I had a couple courier jobs. I'm kind of afraid for what he's up to though. His thing about just shooting people won't work well in most parts of Earth. And even where it wouldn't matter, they'd be upset because he looks a bit too much like a common varmint animal found in those places."

Star-Lord has posed:
     What Mikh says about the whole timeline, and sterile parents thing makes him frown deeply into his Spaghetti-O's. Great, not only was he getting himself and his crew into trouble this nut job could mess with his Mom. He pushes his bowl away. "Groot you want the rest?" he asks since the big guy seemed to be enjoying what was left in the pot. Back to Mikh, he shakes his head and asks, "What's a Voldemort?"

     Rocket earns his own Peter frown, "And yeah, I really need to put a tracker on the guy, just blasting people is -not- going to be cool here," then realizing that may not be what Groot needs to hear, he makes himself smile and adds, "But I am sure he'll be fine."

StarDrake has posed:
"I was a kid on Earth, Pete. Long time ago by my clock. There was a popular series of stories written for kids, and I was just a little too old for it, but I read it anyway. British woman writer, wrote about this kid whose parents were killed by an evil wizard, because there was a prophecy that their kid would kill him. Evil wizard was named Lord Voldemort, because why not. The kid's parents were also wizards, but when Voldy murdered them, the mom protected wee Harry, and the death-curse bounced back on Voldy. So he was raised by his norm Aunt and Uncle who hated wizards, but got taken off to learn to be a wizard when he was 11 years old. It turned out to be a seven book series that took her ten years to finish, I kid you not. Anyway I ended up with this robot spaceship gig not long after the last book came out. And yes, the wizard caused his own demise, the idiot would've been fine if he had just ignored the prophecy."

Sounds like a typical comic-book plot, right? Or something like that.

Mikh grins at the thought of Rocket being fine. Odds are 75:20 against. Unless he fell in with a band or something. Then he'd actually be pretty safe, because bands are usually worse than Rocket. HA! Thrash Panda... OK.

"Yeah, we do need to see how big his bar tab has gotten, right? But Gamora is going after him so ... oh frell. She'll blow up so much stuff..."

Star-Lord has posed:
     Peter cocks his head as Mikh spells out this Harry Potter stuff for him. "Actually, that doesn't sound half bad," he says after a moment of consideration. He reaches into his jacket and pulls out a note pad and a pen, he scribbles 'Harry Potter' down. "Added it to the shopping list." Other items on the list: Nintendo, DVD player, New Star Wars movies and so on.

     "Yeah, but with Gamora they'll never see who did it. And anyhow it's not the first planet we've ditched a bar tab on," Peter says with a smile. "And Earth's easier to visit again afterwards, no real planetary law enforcement." At least none that would bother the Guardians over a bar tab. Though all of that gets Peter to thinking.

     "Mikh, what do you think of Earth now that you're back? Does it feel the same to you now that you've seen the rest of the Galaxy?" he asks, leaning on the table.

StarDrake has posed:
Mikh scans the list.

"Oh, Pete, watch out for those new Star Wars movies. Just ... the force was NOT with the prequel trio."

Warning delivered, the robot considers taking a taste of Spaghetti-Ohs, but then realizes he can synthesize it from the smell. He hasn't re-configured the fuel intake on this chassis to Terran food yet, anyway.

"Yeah, they're on the cusp of having planetary enforcers though. You seen the space station they have hanging over Washington DC? The Peak? That's SHIELD's counterpart agency SWORD, there. One of the strangest feelings for me."

A moment to contemplate in human-realtime, because it works better that way for conversation.

"I knew a long time that I couldn't come home again. It's Earth, but it's not the same place I left. And I'm really not the same person who left. Literally, I replaced all my parts more than twice over."

He grins a bit at that last line. It's frighteningly true.

Star-Lord has posed:
     "Yeah, but I heard George Lucas directed those, not the other guys who did the Han Solo and the rest," he says of Prequels. "He can't mess up his own stuff right?" Peter asks sound actually hurt by the idea.

     "Yeah, there's a lot of stuff up here that wasn't here when I left, that Peak thing, the Watchtower and the Canuck station Alpha Flight uses, King or something?" he says and shakes his head. "Anyhow, since you brought up SHIELD, I'm working on a meet with their boss, figure he might be good for a bit of work, plus, I hear they want to get rid of alien artifacts when they think they're too dangerous to be left on the planet. Who better than us for that job, right?"

     He circles back to the changes nodding, "That's it right there, this isn't the Earth I left. Back then it made sense, now, it's all new Star Wars movies and MP3 players. I mean, I still have my old parts, but I guess I really am a spaceman now. Weird."

StarDrake has posed:
"It really is different. And you're more than just a spaceman, you're Starlord, right?"

Mikh grins. His ship-name, so very similar, but Quill actually has some vague reason to use the Lord part of it.

Groot finishes the Spaghetti-Ohs and leaves, not even telling the others that He Is Groot. Perhaps the conversation has gotten too deep. Or he's going off to root for a while.

"Lucas ... I remember him getting a little obsessed with old movie serials, and he had no clue how tone-deaf those things were to racism and stuff like that, so he ended up with some bad ideas. He always did better with other people to put the brakes on his bad ideas. Some people need that. And when he didn't have that... I came back here on a delivery a while back and checked. He ended up selling to Disney. DISNEY. And they made more movies. Better than Lucas did, but not as creative, not as edgy. At least the ones I was able to download."

The universe really is a different place, isn't it?

Star-Lord has posed:
     "Damn right," Peter says about his name with a little bit of a smile showing on his lips ,

     Groot's departure is noted and the big tree gets a wave before he turns his head back to Mikh.

"Ah man, I so don't want to hear this, but how bad are these things, man? And Disney, what the heck!? So, what do the characters break into song while swinging lightsabers now? Lame." Like Disney could ever make a great space movie. Ahem.

StarDrake has posed:
"The post-Disney movies don't suck, at least the ones I saw. Dancing? Yeahhhh they kinda made a videogame. It has mixed reviews. It's a bit like the Christmas Special."

Mikh commandeers an unused screen, and starts playing the Kinect Han Solo Dancing scene. It's cruel, he knows Peter will either really love it or he'll totally hate it. Actually, odds are that he'll like it because it's dancing, right?

Han Solo Dancing. He rises up the floor, two very strange Imperial workers dance behind him, and ... well. If Peter's upset, imagine having to play that back from inside your mind.

Star-Lord has posed:
     Peter's brain is breaking here. "Wait, a dancing video game? For Star Wars," he asks, to him Terran games were Mario and Duck Hunt, the idea of Guitar Hero and DDR were alien to him.

     When Mikh, commandeers the screen, Peter can't help but watch, like a car wreck right? At first he cringes, covering his face with his hands, "What's up with that music?" he asks. "Is that a cousin of yours singing?" he asks, auto-tune, gotta love it. Though once the 'new' music begins to settle in, he starts nodding his head and watching the moves displayed on the side of the screen. He stands up, watching for a moment before he stars to dance along, rocking a little Double Blaster action, before doing Not a Scratch. "Okay, this isn't bad. So how do people play the actual game? You just press buttons and watch the guys on the screen dance?" he asks, intrigued. Mikh, what have you done? Does he stop dancing, of course not.

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lg_FoEy8T_A

StarDrake has posed:
"Man. I'm gonna have to hack a kineck," Mike says. "It's a Microsoft game console with cameras. It watches your head, hands, and feet and it uses that to track how well you follow their dance instructions."

Earth has to be in range for internet, right? OK, so it'll be slow. Mikh connects and places an order for a Kinekt to send to his mail-drop on Earth. Because he has one. Yes, the Guardians (except for Peter) are going to be hating on the robot... if they ever find out that this was his fault. Perhaps we'll keep it our secret? Except that he'll also need to find a copy of Biomutant ... yeah.

//This is probably going to get worse before it gets better. Perhaps Darkseid will kill us all (if he isn't dead or close enough for rock-n-roll) and we won't have to suffer for my mistake,// Mikh thinks to himself.

Star-Lord has posed:
     Peter stops mid Falcon in Flight, eyes going wide like a kid's on Christmas. "Wait, you play the game by dancing? Because, if you do, I definitely need one of those games. I don't care how much they cost." Not that it matters the fabricator down by the engines can make paper money. He straightens up, and smiles. "Heh, maybe the old homeworld hasn't gone totally nuts after all."